Grief Biography

My Disappearing Mother: A Memoir of Magic and Loss is far more than a memoir on the devastation that comes with dementia, a cognitive impairment that affects fifty-five million people worldwide. Finnamore beautifully chronicles her mother's rich and varied life journey, from her birth in Puerto Rico during the height of the Depression to ferrying to the United States, in hopes of a better life. On U.S. soil, her mother, Bunny, started working as a performer for enlisted men, then became a secretary, and eventually a professional clairvoyant.

A searing debut YA poetry and essay collection about a Black cancer patient who faces medical racism after being diagnosed with leukemia in their early twenties, for fans of Audre Lorde's The Cancer Journals and Laurie Halse Anderson's Shout. When Walela is diagnosed at twenty-three with...

A daughter returns home to the Navajo reservation to retrace her mother’s life in a memoir that is both a narrative and an archive of one family’s troubled history “An honest, intimate, and heart-wrenching memoir that explores the fractured family, the damaging effects of alcoholism and...

A remarkably frank, deeply moving, and inspiring memoir by Jai Pausch, whose husband, Randy, wrote the bestseller The Last Lecture while battling pancreatic cancer. "Jai is such a giver that she often forgets to take care of herself," Randy Pausch wrote about his wife. "Jai knows that...

An unflinching and luminous memoir that explores a father’s philosophical transformation when he must reconsider the questions what makes us human? and whose life is worth living? Before becoming a father, Chris Gabbard was a fast-track academic finishing his doctoral dissertation at Stanford...

Your dream might be over, but your life isn’t. Embrace your broken dream as a chance for a new beginning and see how a “Resurrection Year” can restore your soul. After ten years of tear-soaked prayers and repeatedly dashed hopes, Sheridan Voysey and his wife come to a heart-breaking...

In a raw and inspiring reflection on grief, a mourning sister processes her personal story of loss by exploring the history of bereavement customs. When Amanda Held Opelt suffered a season of loss—including three miscarriages and the death of her grandmother and culminating in the unexpected...

Butterfly Awakens depicts the story of the extraordinary transformation of a forty-something Italian American attorney as she moves through unimaginable grief and sadness watching her beloved mother lose her battle to breast cancer.

Enola Holmes meets Buffy the Vampire Slayer in this thrilling YA fantasy adventure from debut author J. A. Morgenstein, perfect for fans of Jennifer Lynn Barnes and Philip Pullman. It's 1909 and Rose Moriarty—teenage daughter of Sherlock Holmes' greatest enemy—has made a name for herself...

Struggle. Overcome. Inspire. For Jacky Hunt-Broersma, a cancer diagnosis in her mid-twenties brought a life-changing challenge: a below-the-knee amputation. Navigating her new reality, Jacky first kept her difference hidden as she learned to walk and do daily activities using a prosthesis. Years...

An astonishing memoir of love's enduring power, resilience and transformation, If Only Love is a celebration of the timeless connection between two souls—a real-life love story for the ages. In 1973, a seventeen-year-old Canadian girl meets an American boy on her first day of school in Japan...

Mama Drama is a deeply personal and emotionally charged memoir by Sheri Smith that takes listeners on a journey through the highs and lows of her extraordinary life. From a childhood on Broadway at age seven, to starring in the iconic M&M commercial (“Melts in Your Mouth, Not in Your Hand”), Smith’s story unfolds through pivotal moments such as building a thriving catering business, managing a castle-themed vacation rental in Hawaii, and ultimately losing everything in 2014.

Barton Rubenstein had a picture-perfect childhood—a loving family, idyllic summers at the beach, and a particularly close kinship with his progressive, charismatic, and devoted mom. When she died after a brutal five-year battle with cancer, Barton, just 18, found himself confronted by unbearable heartbreak. He was also saddened that his mother had not realized many of her dreams, and felt terrified that he could meet the same fate. This fear sent him headlong into a life of unexpected adventures and achievements, feeling that tomorrow could be too late.

A collection of the journals, fiction, and letters of the late Esther Grace Earl, who passed away in 2010 at the age of 16. Essays by family and friends will help to tell Esther’s story along with an introduction by award-winning author John Green who dedicated his #1 bestselling novel The Fault in Our Stars to her.

The day after Luna Jaffe’s only child died from a miscalculation of codeine cough syrup she began to write letters to him. One day, he began to write back. Together they explore who they are now, in this rearranged world. Told through a raw, unflinching narrative that weaves poetry, art, and spiritual experiences, the book is an exploration of unbearable sorrow but also a testament to the resilience of the human spirit and the mysterious ways in which love transcends death.

Experiencing Grief is inevitable in life because death is certain. Nobody can avoid it, and yet it seems that too many people hide from this fact, preferring to 'leave it till later'. The very word 'death' is whispered and most often dodged if possible, preferring words like 'lost', 'passed' or 'sleeping'. Grief can be a shock when death occurs, even if it has been previously experienced because grief is never the same.

A wrenching, lyrical memoir by Skins and Game of Thrones star Hannah Murray, exploring the spiritual awakening that turned into a mental breakdown, and the healing made possible when we learn to save ourselves He sat me down in a chair and he told me, in no uncertain terms, that magic is real...

Marsha Gray Hill’s Grief and Grit(s) is an emotional odyssey that illuminates the complexities of grief, while offering a beacon of hope and inspiration for those navigating their own journeys of loss. This extraordinary memoir serves as a testament to the resilience of the human spirit and the power of love to transcend even the darkest of times.

In my mind, I felt the better I played the part of normal, the better off my kids would be emotionally. Even if that meant, in my world, I would continue to deny that Evan was gone.

In 2015 former England football star Rio Ferdinand suddenly and tragically lost his wife and soul mate, Rebecca, age 34, to cancer. It was a profound shock, and Rio found himself struggling to cope not just with the pain of his grief but also with his new role as both mum and dad to their three young children. Rio's BBC1 documentary Being Mum and Dad touched everyone who watched it and won huge praise for the honesty and bravery he showed in talking about his emotions and experiences.